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Let's hope 'Family Tree' plants firmer roots

Family Tree HBO, Sunday, 10:30 ET/PT *** out of four Sometimes family is where you find it – if you just bother to look. That's the lesson learned by Tom Chadwick in this agreeable short-run HBO mockumentary

That's the lesson learned by Tom Chadwick in this agreeable, short-run HBO mockumentary from the master of the form, Christopher Guest (Best in Show, Waiting for Guffman) and the show's co-creator, Jim Piddock. Tree is not the master at his best — it's one of those light entertainments that pass by without leaving much of a mark. But it's good-hearted and amusing, and with the season winding down, it's an easy way for viewers to edge into summer.

Chris O'Dowd adds considerably to the show's charm as Tom, a temporarily down-on-his luck Brit who was taken away to Ireland by his mom after his parents' divorce. Now back in England where he was born, he's reunited with his childhood best friend, Pete (Tom Bennett); his TV loving father, Keith (the great Michael McKean); and his sister, Bea (Nina Conti), who travels everywhere with a talking monkey hand-puppet.

Think about that monkey, because it's a good example of Family's way with a joke and a good test of whether you'll find the joke funny. When first introduced, it seems like a strained, silly quirk. But the more time you spend with the show, the better you understand the purpose the puppet serves in Bea's life, and the funnier his bitter, nasty asides become. It turns out that Bea and her puppet are the world's worst ventriloquist comedy act, something the monkey understands but Bea doesn't.

That small family circle is pretty much the sum of Tom's social life — until an elderly aunt dies and leaves him a trunk of what seems to be assorted junk. But Tom quickly realizes it's filled with clues that can lead him to an extended family he has never known. And soon he's on the hunt, pausing only now and then for the terrible blind dates Pete keeps pushing upon him.

The result is a weekly, connected quest that takes Tom and Pete on a series of adventures and introduces them to a horde of eccentrics. Tracing his ancestors — a varied collection of photographers, failed actors, vaudevillians and Olympic athletes — leads Tom to living relatives he has never met and eventually will lead him to places he never thought he'd visit.

The problem, for the moment, is that so far the only people who really register are the people already in Tom's life when his quest began, which makes his search seem pointless. While this may change as the show progresses, for now, Tom's encounters come across as nothing more than comedy routines — fun, but quickly forgotten.

Still, there's a yearning in O'Dowd's performance, born from Tom's desire to fill a hole in his life, that shows promise of a depth Family may yet achieve. Let's hope so.